Quiet in the extremity of his disturbance, Mr. Treffry leaned forward in his chair, rested his big hands on its arms, and stared at her.
Chris! Here was a woman he did not know! His lips moved under the heavy droop of his moustache. The girl's face had suddenly grown white. She sank down on her knees, and laid her cheek against his hand. He felt it wet; and a lump rose in his throat. Drawing his hand away, he stared at it, and wiped it with his sleeve.
“Don't cry!” he said.
She seized it again and clung to it; that clutch seemed to fill him with sudden rage.
“What's the matter? How the devil can I do anything if you don't tell me?”
She looked up at him. The distress of the last days, the passion and fear of the last hour, the tide of that new life of the spirit and the flesh, stirring within her, flowed out in a stream of words.
When she had finished, there was so dead a silence that the fluttering of a moth round the lamp could be heard plainly.
Mr. Treffry raised himself, crossed the room, and touched the bell. “Tell the groom,” he said to Dominique, “to put the horses to, and have 'em round at once; bring my old boots; we drive all night....”
His bent figure looked huge, body and legs outlined by light, head and shoulders towering into shadow. “He shall have a run for his money!” he said. His eyes stared down sombrely at his niece. “It's more than he deserves!—it's more than you deserve, Chris. Sit down there and write to him; tell him to put himself entirely in my hands.” He turned his back on her, and went into his bedroom.
Christian rose, and sat down at the writing-table. A whisper startled her. It came from Dominique, who was holding out a pair of boots.